Rwanda president Paul Kagame publicly endorsed the petition to establish World Great Apes Day in his speech at the annual Kwita Izina gorilla naming ceremony on 5 September near Volcanoes National Park.

The Great Apes Survival Partnership (GRASP) welcomed the recent arrest of Guinea’s former wildlife director, who is believed to have played a key role in illegally exporting hundreds of chimpanzees and other endangered wildlife from the West African nation beginning in 2008.